In a last minute college counseling change over this past summer, Bullis welcomes Ms. Valerie Martin to campus. Ms. Martin officially joined the college counseling office on August 15, 2017 as an Assistant Director of College Counseling and is excited to share her experience and expertise about college admissions with the senior class. Ms. Martin was born and raised in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, a rural countryside of Pennsylvania where many Amish communities also live. As young as 7th grade, she knew that she wanted to pursue a career within the field of psychology and counseling. “I have always been interested with working with people and helping to solve any problems they had”said Ms. Martin She developed this passion and study throughout her time in high school and eventually earned her bachelor’s degree in Psychology and a minor in philosophy from Gettysburg College in Pennsylvania. After completing her undergraduate degree at Gettysburg College, Ms. Martin worked at a counseling service in the state of Pennsylvania, only to return back to Gettysburg to work in the admissions office a year later. Ms. Martin went on to work for admission offices for Gettysburg for five years and took on several positions: from being an Admission Counselor to being a Senior Assistant Director of Admissions and the Coordinator of Campus Visits Programs and International Admissions. Like most College Admission Counselors, Ms. Martin traveled to different cities and high schools promoting Gettysburg College. However, Ms. Martin got to travel further than the usual United States college tour routes and instead went on trips to China, Taiwan, Singapore, Vietnam, Thailand, Philipines, England, Scotland, France, and more to speak about Gettysburg college to potential international students.After her fifth year of working on the college side of admissions, Ms. Martin decided that she wanted to try a calmer and more individualized perspective of the college admissions process by working on the high school side. Working on the high school side of the admissions process not only allows Ms. Martin to settle down and have a more “regular” job; she gets to use her passion of psychology and counseling with high school students who are going through this stressful time in their lives.Ms. Martin states that several things about Bullis attracted her to the campus. “Bullis is a great community in general and has a great reputation of that in this area, this team [of college counselors] are very welcoming and made me feel awesome when I interviewed, and having a large number of international students on campus is great because I worked with international students at Gettysburg”said Ms. Martin. During her time at Bullis so far, she has not been disappointed with her first impressions of the school and continues to learn more about our campus each day.Outside of work and the college application process, Ms. Martin can be found cooking meals, petting her cats, traveling the world, spending her time outdoors, and spending time organizing and planning her upcoming wedding! Though new to our campus and to the job, Ms. Martin states that “though I may be new to Bullis and college counseling, I have the most recent and direct experience with reading and reviewing thousands of applications. The physical act of applying to colleges is something I can help anybody with and I also have experience in interviewing students so I can do mock interviews and help students with those types of things.” Ms. Martin wants to let students know that she is always here for anybody with college help or questions and is looking forward to helping seniors find their next home.